Landscape Architect

General construction company

General contractor

Residence

Cost

Text description provided by the architects. The project on the city-block E2 appears as a singular and unique object; It signals the idea of a renewal of the main entry point to this neighborhood. This is why the architects chose to experiment with the implementation of two quality materials that are both complementary and opposites: brick for its domestic thickness and for its strong reference to the ground and to neighboring red brick façades; lacquered metal used for the lightness of this material and because it discretely hints at the comfort of the housing units and the use of balconies, while still avoiding their exposure to viewers from the street.

The project’s architecture integrates three scales of perception: • An urban perception of the neighborhood: this is manifested in the dynamic and skewed views from the Avenue de la Concorde, and from the new streets in the neighborhood. It mainly refers to the contours and profile of the coping and to the line of acroteria, to the relations between diverse buildings and to the unusual hues and textures of the façades. It translates the first perception of the neighborhood for people arriving from the avenue Henri Barbusse: it surprises and incites people to come and have a look around.

• A finer architectural reading: the perception at the pedestrian level underscores the importance of the treatment in brick on the ground floor, the implementation of materials, the style of the façades composed of semi-transparencies and opacities, and the porosity of the block and its green spaces. It makes it possible to qualify the domestic nature of the housing units in relation to the street.

• To these scales are added the expression of two programs: one addresses the collective housing and imposes its urban presence, the other, the Residence, will express a program rather more like a large family house, in a reference to the avenue Charon. This interlocking of scales guided the architects’ architectural strategies and the volumetric choices.